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The big red diagonal stripe across the hull was unmistakable: the U.S. Coast Guard. But we were almost certain that we were in Cuban waters. What was the U.S. Coast Guard doing here? It seems they had the same question of us. What were WE doing here, they queried over Channel 16 on the VHF radio.

Dad answered the phone. I'll never forget the emotion in his voice. I don't think he believed we'd get out of Panama alive or really ever arrive within striking distance of them after all these years on distant shores. We had arrived in San Diego and he couldn't believe it. My dad was a pretty stoic guy à la 1950s era when dads were supposed to be the disciplinarian, and no-shows of tender feelings. He cracked with my phone call. It touched me.

We waited. For four months we waited in Golfito, Costa Rica, and in France. We waited for Michel to return to the boat following his medical emergency. It was a Panic in Panama when he was urgently evacuated from the canal zone—having been overcome by septicemia—just as the Americans were about to launch the Invasion of Panama in November 1989. The boys and I were alone on Cowabunga.

"Bam!" Oh %#@!! Here we go again. Déjà vu. The headstay on the roller furl broke and it all came crashing down—again, the third time in three years. A year earlier we were off the coast of Brazil, under a light wind, when a part gave way on the bottom furling drum that was anchored by the turnbuckle on the deck. This time it turned out to be a stainless steel plate at the top of the mast.

We were winding up our sojourn in French Guiana. With the $5,000 windfall bonus we earned from the Columbia University chartered trip from Fortaleza, Brazil, to St. Peter and St. Paul Rocks, plus the money we were able to save from working in Cayenne for the past seven months, we felt we had some wiggle room to head on up through the Caribbean, and eventually to the East Coast of the States. But first and foremost, we would try to see if Michel could get some medical attention for his hernia in Martinique.

Rio had been our rallying point for well over a year, and now it was time to move on. We had done a good amount of exploring from Rio south to Buenos Aires and back. We had met some amazing people: Brazilians, French and American expatriates, and all manner of foreigners in between. Family and friends from the States and France had come to visit us. We celebrated some birthdays, we learned some Brazilian Portuguese, we experienced Carnaval, we learned a bit about Brazilian culture, the country, and day-to-day living; we cultivated a “cruising” world of friends, we had some minor “catastrophes,” we had settled in to this itinerant lifestyle, as did the kids. It was time to move on, think about the next step, the next country, the next continent, and the next opportunity to earn some money.

"American ship, American ship, calling American ship," the VHF radio cackled on channel 16, somewhere in the southern Atlantic between Africa and South America. It was deep into a dark, hot night, as I was about to go on my watch.

Santa swapped out his sleigh and reindeer for a French military helicopter, landing on the soccer field at the French military base on the outskirts of Dakar. Our 3 year-old son, Sean, was ecstatic. Christmas in this western outpost of Africa was indeed something out of the ordinary for us.

We first spied the telltale “tippy-tops” of the palm trees of the islands poking just barely above the horizon—our first hint that we were almost there—after about a week at sea. The San Blas Islands were every bit as much as one would imagine pristine white-sand, coral-reefed tropical islands to be: picture-perfect postcard atolls with crystal clear, aqua-blue water lagoons that lapped deserted, powder-sugared bleached beaches, with the requisite clump of coconut trees leaning just inside the photo frame. The only thing missing was the proverbial tattered shipwrecked cartoon character.

About Janis

Sail Cowabunga! A Family's Ten Years at Sea, Janis Couvreux is a journalist, sailor, mom, grandmom, traveler, and Franco-American, blogging at the Huffington Post and The Lady Alliance about living bilingually, crossing oceans, backpacking adventures, and raising kids outside the box.